Indeed "Love it or leave it" is an irresistably powerfully closing point in any reasoned argument ... but why the hurry to get there, denying your audience the entertainment of so many intermediate points and counterpoints?

Of course all these points are destined to end up in the bonfire of irrelevancies when one disputant or the other lobs this Ace of Trumps clincher ...but why spoil the fun?

Good move. [And yes, such a registry would already be illegal, and Trump probably wasn't going to attempt it anyway, but that's not the point.] Many GOP Rep's will feel compelled to vote for this measure -- if it gets a vote.

And it can still be derailed by poison-pill "religious freedom" amendments that will shear off Democratic votes.

Ever and always, elections are not about what you want. Elections are about what we get.

Now we're gonna get things that all of us put together ("us" meaning everyone here on earth, and everyone yet to come) may not be able to fix. Ever. No matter how much we learn. No matter how hard we try.

Ironic that Walkinshaw's criticism of Jayapal is viewed as devastating. Yes, she proposes legislative measures that are dead on arrival ...but isn't this exactly what her adherents want? a rep who will passionately pitch far outside the legislative strike zone (A la Sanders, for instance), in hopse it will slide the Overton window to the left? This is the virtue many Seattleites saw in Jim McDermott.

But McDermott was an adept legislator in Olympia years before he took his act to DC. And McDermott skillfully guided major pieces of legislation through the House at the same time he held the far post as left-most Member of Congress!

I imagined the race to succeed McDermott would bring us an embarrassment of riches ... but neither of these tyro's is anywhere near equipped to fill Jim's shoes.

Of the two, I see more potential in Walkinshaw. And I doubt Jayapal's rags-to-relevance bio stands up to close scrutiny. But take your pick and hope for the best, and there's always 2018.

Wouldn't a goddam REAL socialist advocate for open bilateral trade (increasing aggregate output on both sides of the trade relatinship) in conjunction with socialized redistribution of the resulting gains?

As for "crushing it", $2.4M is on the order of a penny per US registered voter.

If that sum were devoted to a single flippable House seat (which it's not), it'd be on the order of $5 a head -- not enough to determine the outcome, but enough to push the opposition to respond in kind.

Wait a minute, what? Sanders asks you to help flip the House and Senate by raising $$$ for 13 candidates ... one of which is Pramila Jayapal.

Regardless of your take on Jayapal, can you possibly imagine in your wildest fever dreams that the WA-7 contest has anything to do with flipping the House?

Sanders can move million$$ by blasting emails with Ryan taglines, and Ryan can move million$$ by blasting emails with Sanders taglines, and they're both playing on the cupidity of their least savvy followers.